Monday, 29 September 2008

My trip report, left out until the end due to the sheer amount of ARIA material I found. Please take a look at the archives navigation bar on the right hand side!

April 01, 2008

The day started at 4am for last minute packing and breakfast and they were finished ahead of schedule, which meant I had 24 minutes to watch something very important on my laptop before leaving for the airport - ARIA the Origination finale, which had aired 11 hours prior. A very symbolic start to my ARIA-inspired trip to Venice.

A worthy note that I refused to carry any ARIA material on grounds that I wanted a relaxing vacation rather than running around matching things.

My very first flight on a true budget airline (Easyjet) and the flight left on time, the service excellent and it was only £50 return! I got a good view of the Alps and much more as I had strategically grabbed the emergency exit seat on the right hand side of the aircraft, and my gamble paid off during the final approach.

We arrived at Venice Marco Polo at 11:30am and the immigration was very fast - then things went downhill. Any bus journeys starting from the airport incurred a surcharge. What a rip. I had also planned to carry my backpack around for the day but it was too heavy for my mum. Instead of the bus to Venezia, we hopped onto the one bound for Mestre to drop off our stuff. We took the local ACTV bus because it was cheaper than the express bus and would give us a true slice-of-life experience. At Mestre, we missed the hourly bus to our accomodation while my mum was getting me a cheese Panini. That was the last straw - we dumped our stuff at the Mestre rail station and took the next bus bound for Venezia!

I finally arrived in Venezia at 2pm. Weather was pleasantly cool, sunny but extremely hazy. One of my first sights after arrival was how the putrid water shimmered under the arch of the bridge.

More pictures of my first impression...

A dead end from mapless alley exploration!

Random church, and docked Gondolas.

By this time, I was getting rather disappointed with Venice. The buildings looked rather run-down and crumbling, a fair bit of graffiti and some derelict houses, evidence of the declining Venezian populace.

I was on the constant lookout for Traghettos. I did not have any idea where Traghetto Santa Sofia is - which was the location of ARIA the Origination ep04. I would later find out my map mislabled it as Pescaria. Nonetheless, I totally lucked out as I happened to be in the area and saw the sign for Traghetto Santa Sofia! Unfortunately, the market was closed but the place smelled strongly of fish. After waiting, I hopped onto the Traghetto which cost €0.60. With a load factor of 3 passengers, I could sit and snap away pictures!

Some houses are built over alleys. The top of the tunnel is made of wood...as my mum sets out checking out the food.

The main throughfare to Rialto and Rialto itself reeked of total tourist consumerism. It was packed with lemmings and shops selling near-identical merchandise - and this was LOW season! My impression of Venice declines further as not only was it run-down but I've never seen such a blatent tourist trap. I felt sick. At least the Grand Canal was pretty.

Needless to say, this was my one and only time to cross the Rialto bridge. We soon took refuge in the quieter alleys. Luckily, the tourist crowd only stick to certain streets. A random fountain in a quiet alley, and an ARIA reference - chrysanthenum.

We got ripped off on my first Gelato purchase - bloody lady gave us small scoops. My impression of Venice gone even lower. We soon made it to the Scalzi bridge and the Church which appears only once in ARIA (the Origination ep12).

We then walked around the Cannaregio Canal and its environs. We found a CO-OP store selling very cheap provisions where we bought bread, water and snacks for meal substitution in the coming days.

Then we did something totally criminal - we had dinner at a chinese restaurant on the grounds of familiarity, price and how it fills you up quickly! Then a walk through the Jewish ghetto - we saw some Hebrew signs there and a little more alley exploration. It was sunset by now and we hopped on the bus to Mestre to collect our luggage before hopping on the hourly bus to our accomodation at Fusina!

We checked in at 9pm, totally exhausted only to hear even more bad news. To the Italian boat operator, "April" meant the second week of April - which meant the last sailing Venice -> Fusina would be 6pm, instead of 8pm. I was beyond disappointed, but at least the trailerhome was clean, heating worked well and the shared shower/toilets were the cleanest I've ever experienced. All for €30 a night for two, not bad at all. Sleep came at around 11pm.

To sum it up I felt emotionally dry upon arrival to Venezia and was stressed, angry and disappointed. The best highlight being Traghetto Santa Sofia but in retrospect, I managed to get some great pictures which I did not appreciate at the time. Fortunately, Day 2 was to prove very different.

Tuesday, 23 September 2008

I was made aware of a picture drama in the ARIA THE ANIMATION Desktop Accesories (System Voice, Screen Saver, Wallpapers, etc.) CD-ROM by Solais where the 3 of them take turns practicing tour guiding. This picture drama has an animated map showing which part of Neo-Venezia the 3 of them are currently in.

Which also means, it gives away the approximate location of ARIA Company...and my analysis was actually spot on! Below is the "official" location.

As far as I know, this picture drama has not been translated into English.

Thursday, 18 September 2008

Warning: This will be a rather vague post using outrageous assumptions.

ARIA Company, the most important location of them all in the whole of ARIA. However fictitious it may be, however impossible it seemed, it was still a requirement for me as an ARIA fan to investigate.

Orientation

The first thing to find was the compass direction and the producers were ever so kind to include a windvane on the roof...except there is a discontinuity error.

ARIA Company faces East in the Animation

...but faces South in The Origination.

However, by piecing together visual and circumstancial evidence, I can quickly conclude that ARIA Company indeed faces South.

Circumstancial Evidence

1. ARIA the Animation ep11, the three of them walk along the waterfront promonade westwards (with Symphony insert song playing).

2. ARIA the OVA ~ ARIETTA, Akari faces East from the Campanile when pointing out the direction of ARIA Company (can be deduced from ground lighting).

3. ARIA the Origination ep5, when the three split up at Himeya after practice, Akari is rowing East.

4. ARIA the Origination ep5.5, Akari approaches the fork of the southern promonade from the West (timestamp 02:20).

These evidence point to ARIA Company located somewhere between Himeya and the fork at East Castello on the southern promonade.

Visual Evidence

Looking Westwards from ARIA Company, we see the island of San Giogio Maggiore.

Looking West North West we see the outline of San Marco's Basilica and Campanile.

Amano art, view from ARIA Company facing south, with San Giorgio Maggiore seen in the South West, partially obscured by Aika.

But a semi-overhead view shows a promonade but with an unfamiliar looking outcrop, with ARIA Company built in front.

So while ARIA Company is actually pretty much fiction, one can more or less work out where it's "supposed" to be, the most likely being where the vaporetto stop is on the left hand side of the picture.

Wednesday, 10 September 2008

(While the Chinese translation has probably been around, I've never seen the Japanese ARIA manga in Hong Kong until today...)

Last summer (2007), I went to the best-known Japanese bookstore in Hong Kong on 11/F of the SOGO Department Store. No ARIA manga - only a perfect guidebook.

Two weeks ago I went there - only the Origination Perfect Guidebook.

I just went there this evening again to look for educational books and checked out the manga section again. To my joy and pleasure, they actually stocked up ARIA on the bookshelf! Some volumes were missing, presumably sold! What a pleasant surprise, although my plan of a "Book Off" raid in the future to collect all volumes remain unchanged for now.

Another first at the bookstore is that, I saw the "Dengeki G" and the "Megami" magazines on sale. My friend had told me Dengeki is more conservative compared with Megami and their rather skimpy official art. This month's Dengeki had a rather un-worksafe piece of plastic on the cover. Megami had a Gurren-Lagann cover, which I've never watched purely due to the character design being unappealing to my eyes.

As I proceeded to look for the price tag (with no intention of buying), I realised I looked like a bloody nerd, a true "no-life king".

恥ずかしい。。。

恥ずかしい雑誌禁止!

...and I scurried away, to look for revision books for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test.

Friday, 5 September 2008

After 5 long months of leisure-watching, I've finished re-watching the whole of the ARIA series! Here are the messages I've picked out of ARIA the Origination. I omitted quite a few as some of them felt too idealistic or utopic.

Navigation 01: そのやがて訪れる春の風に… / In The Spring Breeze That Finally Came To Visit...

It’s important to constantly think you always have some way to go in personal development because once you’re satisfied with your abilities, you won’t be able to move forward any further.

You should accept your imperfect self and have fun with life!

Navigation 04: その 明日を目指すものたちは… / The Things We Aim For Tomorrow...

One shouldn’t be too hard and inflexible as it will prevent learning and improvement. You should be flexible instead and willing to transform yourself.

Navigation 08: その 大切な人の記憶に… / That Important Person's Memories...

Even the greatest of people have their own insecure side.

Memories are treasures which you keep in a treasure chest.

Navigation 11: その 変わりゆく日々に… / On These Changing Days...

A pure friendship should not have any prerequisites in order to meet and confide.

Navigation 13: その 新しいはじまりに… / To That New Beginning...

Change can be tough but one can look forward to the new positive experiences that await.

At a mean of 7.50, it scores the highest out of all three ARIA series in my head.

The final episodes of ARIA the Origination also provided me with some picture matching opportunities!

In the real-life Venice, the wells were covered with sturdy metal lids, not the rotten wood Aika managed to jump onto!

So far in ARIA, we had only seen 2 of the 3 (functioning) bridges across the Grand Canal. In Ep11 of The Origination, we finally see the last one - the Scalzi Bridge, complete with the Scalzi Church!

"Himeya has opened another branch near Santa Lucia Station" - AkariWhile I got a negative match from google maps satellite, I could still pinpoint the exact location of where the producers threw in the new Himeya branch.

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About Me

Good day everyone, I write about my anime location trips on my blogs. I have dedicated blogs for Aria and Hyouka, while The Origination will feature shorter entries.
Please feel free to visit my profile for the links to the Aria and Hyouka blogs. I sincerely hope you enjoy your read.